The Mountain Today

Last week I broke out the shorts. They have been in the bottom dresser drawer, unused since the temps dropped to winter-like levels here in Sedona. While my Gunnison Valley roots make me scoff at the idea of "winter" temperatures in double digits on the plus side of zero, 10 degrees F is not warm. We have had a few cold snaps. I even broke out my snow-blowing down jacket, which I refused to wear last winter in a futile gesture to deny Sedona proper winter status. Cold is cold, but the Gunnison Valley gets a nod for depths of cold generally reserved for Alaska.

Deep winter cold, howling storms with four feet of visibility and sideways snowfall make me feel right. During the '11/'12 winter I didn't experience any of that. I didn't miss it as much as I thought I would because of the commitment I undertook at the Verde Valley School. A couple trips back to Crested Butte were met with Spring-like weather and anemic snowpack. This winter we have not returned to the Colorado high country, but we have delved into the Arizona high country by way of the Arizona Snowbowl resort. It is  a mom-and-pop operation, but it has respectable numbers in that it has more than 2300 feet of vertical and the Agassiz fixed-grip triple chair tops out at 11500 feet. The top of the resort offers very good glade skiing/riding on fairly steep terrain through a forest of mostly pine trees. The base of snow at the top of Agassiz was 72 inches yesterday. That is a fair bit deeper than Crested Butte has this year.

Spring break officially started for me at the end of the work day on Friday. I had worked all but one day in the prior three weeks. A storm blew in from the South West on Friday morning, early, and dropped snow all day and through Saturday. Katie gave me a hall pass for Saturday and I left early in the morning to to navigate I-17 to Flagstaff and up to the resort - stopping for a breakfast sandwich and Americano at Macy's.

Seventeen inches of new snow had fallen over the past 24 hours. I made first Chair for the first run. There is a nervousness/paranoia that goes with powder days for me. A greed to track the untouched blanked of snow. Glide off the lift, stuff the heel into the binding and pull the pant leg to the outside of the highback, ratchet the ladder straps and keep an eye on the people who rolled off the lift behind me. Sliding downhill before the last click of the ratchet to ensure first dibs.

The landscape of a snowstorm - trees blanketed with snow and degrees of white and gray - and the smoothness of the snow-covered terrain blend into a moving canvas. Dive into the deep snow with enough speed to get out before momentum can be denied. Which dance step? The side-to-side, up and down rhythm of some tight, controlled turns or the straight-line, compressed body into an explosive slash? Does the terrain and flora dictate the move or is it wide open and the choice of the rider? Dynamic flow.

While the trip North was for snowboarding in powder, most of the day is spent standing in lift lines and riding the lifts at Snowbowl. I had music playing from my iPhone and didn't do much socializing beyond surface chatter on the chairlift. There was a part of me that wanted to find a friend to share the experience with. The last powder day I had at Snowbowl, Katie and I got to take some runs together and I was positively giddy with excitement, happiness, and stoke. Yesterday the conditions were as good, but the sensations muted.

So I am coming to grips with winter in AZ. The community in Crested Butte, the culture of the lift line, and the history of living in the valley for twenty-plus years meant never riding alone unless one preferred it that way. Since the birth of my sons I have preferred it that way many times because all I wanted was to shred all-out in the finite time I had. Prior to the boys, there was almost never a time I would willingly rida alone if there were a local head to make laps with. Now I am a 40-something stranger at a new resort with a different culture. I could have reached out to some of the folks I was making synchronized laps with, but I didn't.

The mask keeping me warm also concealed my identity. I looked out through bug-eyed, tinted goggles at the crowded lift lines with music playing softly, setting a soundtrack to the day.

A cloud of wet mist hung across mid-mountain and flurries blew down from the sky all day. A blanket of winter storm lay over the mountain as the slow ascent brought the people to the top of the lift. I've been to the resort enough to know where some of the better steep lines are and kept poking around to find lines. Early morning lines brought runs with many untracked choices straight down the fall line. Billowing powder lofted back to the sky with the smack of the tail. Eye a line through the next section of trees and send the snow into an explosion - visibility gone - then find the line in minds eye and charge through the spray until it becomes a reality again.

Line after line of seeking the untouched blanket, then the untouched islands of fresh, then the softest looking piles that had been left unpacked and still holding some of the powder-soft quality. Lift line after lift ride into a line back down the mountain. In my powder-fiend mind I would plot lines on the lift ride up only to panic into a last minute route that had at least one stash close to the top. Fortunately, on a stormy pow day, there are often good stashes found all day. One becomes a little more risk averse as the day moves on - willing to bomb long and straight to have the speed to arch a turn on a billiard table-flat section of untouched that one has to navigate a quarter mile of chunder at mach-Louie to get to.

Curses heard only in my mind about the pain of burning legs echoed over the music. The Black Keys, Bad Religion, Metallica, Baroness, The Sword, and some other rocking bands set the tone, so the cursing fit right in with the soundtrack. Age and limited access have softened my mountain living-hardened body. But the flow is still there. I had to slow things down, stop more often, and take the cartwheels with a sense of humor. Each turn in the fresh or a line well chosen fed into the next. I could stop and catch a breath, have a look around, and get back to it.

Out of the trees and on to the trails near mid-mountain and the mist would stick to the outside of the goggles and immediately freeze. Brand new lenses be damned, I used my frozen gloves as a squeegee and powered on. There was a lot of groaning in the lines about goggles early on, but I think folks started to figure it out.

Paying for lift tickets is a hard pill to swallow after so many years getting them as part of my job. While a $55 lift pass is not such a horrible price for the services provided, it is still a good chunk of change when added to the fuel and food. It is a bit humbling. Add to the fact that there was pretty much no way I would ride from first chair until closing. So now I am a tourist paying the price. Grateful the family allowed for it.

I had some lunch and reloaded the lift. The soreness and fatigue were punctuated by the need to go deeper and take riskier lines for the soft slashes and much longer lines of packed snow to get to the riskier lines added up, too. Here I was sliding through the trees, down the side of a mountain in a snowstorm like I've done thousands of times with hundreds of friends and I wasn't hooting or hollering for any bros. I was just soaking in the soundtrack and thinking about my life today. A stash would manifest itself deep in a wooded section and I'd noodle my way through trying to stay on the softest stuff. A smirk would rub my skin against the soft, wet mask covering my face.

Maybe being covered in all the gear; outerwear, helmet, neck warmer pulled up to my nose, space-man goggles - maybe the exterior is still a young man living the dream of racing down a mountain in a storm. The thrill of the risk vs. reward mentality refined to every decision it takes to navigate down a mountain. The moment is everything. Looking for turns ahead is about all the departure from living now as one can free from the consciousness. When it all comes to a stop and the breath comes heavy, the music and pain comes to focus ones attention is still orbiting now. When the breath comes easier and the pain subsides, it is up to you to decide if you want to stray from the moment or dive into the next section and deliver faster-than-word decisions that keep you upright and between the trees instead of upside down and augured into a lodge pole.

The day ended the same way it began, alone in the car with a drive ahead of me. There were a lot of thoughts of friends and good times past throughout the day. Such is the way today. I get to the mountains, but it is a trip instead of a way of life. The thrill is still there, the flow is still there, the need to be in it is still there.